Bosniak Commander Faces Trial for Mujahideen Atrocities

The state court on Thursday confirmed the indictment of Mahmuljin for failing to stop the volunteer fighters from the Mujahideen unit committing war crimes against Serb civilians and prisoners of war in the village of Vozuca in 1995, or to punish them for what they did.

According to the charges, the Islamic volunteers killed more than 50 Serb prisoners in Vozuca. Some of their heads were cut off and shown to other captives.

The indictment alleges that Mahmuljin failed to take any action in order to prevent the crimes, although he had been informed that members of the unit were getting ready to commit the crime, and failed to do anything in order to punish the crime perpetrators.

According to the charges, members of the Mujahideen unit abused and tortured the captives, cut their ears off, stabbed them all over their bodies, tied them up and beat them with various objects.

They kept the captives tied up in fetus-like positions for several hours with ropes around their necks, the prosecution alleges.

According to the prosecution, the Mujahideen unit had Middle Eastern fighters, but was active within the Third Corps of the Bosnian Army.

Mahmuljin was arrested on December 8 but then released under restrictions.

His arrest was criticised by the leading Bosniak political party, the Party for Democratic Action, which said Mahmuljin was innocent and was only targeted to show that the prosecution is not anti-Serb.

However it was praised by the Bosnian Serb former fighters’ union, which welcomed any progress in prosecuting crimes by Bosniaks against Serbs.